


The 5 stages of Dealing With It

by Mothfluff



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV), b99
Genre: Amy Santiago Loves Jake Peralta, Bad Parent Roger Peralta, Comfort is coming late but it IS coming I promise you, Dealing with Shit is tough, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt Jake Peralta, Jake Peralta Needs a Hug, Jake Peralta is Bad at Feelings, on God we're gonna get that boy some therapy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:33:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29761767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mothfluff/pseuds/Mothfluff
Summary: Jake Peralta did not know how to deal with bad days. And given his job, he had a lot of them.Both of these sentences were understatements. Jake Peralta had no idea, absolutely none, how to deal with anything negative that crashed into his life. And lord, did he have a lot of things crashing into him - physically and emotionally.He had only one idea on what to do with it all: shove it to the back of his head, and don't bother anyone else with it.  The Jake Way.Try as they might, his squad was not much help with it all. And they did try, each in their own way.But then came Amy Santiago, and years of building up walls of denial come crashing down easily when confronted with her soft kind of love.
Relationships: Charles Boyle & Rosa Diaz & Jake Peralta & Amy Santiago, Gina Linetti & Jake Peralta, Jake Peralta/Amy Santiago, Ray Holt & Jake Peralta
Comments: 1
Kudos: 12





	The 5 stages of Dealing With It

**Author's Note:**

> this is all over the place time-line wise, as you will see in the following chapters. Just imagine it stringing through Jake's entire career.

Jake Peralta was known for many things amongst his precinct. His ridiculous pranks, his childish humour (that still got a laugh out of many of them), his over-the-top behaviour and beaming smile that often seemed to mask something a bit less happy, his complete inability to keep anything that was given into his property tidy and organised (case in point: his desk, his locker, his car, and literally any surface area he was allowed to use for more than fifteen minutes), his absolute loyalty and dedication to the people around him no matter how much he’d tease them with bad jokes.

However, he was also very well known, especially amongst his close squad, for not dealing in any way with negative experiences. Sure, Holt might be the ‘robot’ of the group with an unreadable face, and Rosa might be known for not ‘doing’ emotions, as she herself stated. But everyone knew that deep down, it was Jake who would ignore anything that resembled even the littlest bit of emotional turbulence. Any time something happened to him that for other cops might’ve warranted some mental health days or a visit to a therapist, he would smoothe over it with his usual quick jokes and pretend everything was fine, he was fine, things were fine, and could everyone else please stop ignoring the glaringly obvious problem and get on with their day. 

And god, things had happened to him. The man had been kidnapped, shot at, stabbed, beaten down, and otherwise mauled by perps. He’d come face to face with bomb threats and actual bombs, his friends being held hostage, his closest found-family being threatened and hurt and endangered because of him. He’d been pulled down by cases that drove him almost mad and made him treat his own health even worse than he already did in everyday life. He’d been sent to the hospital several times a year because of his job, far more often than any other cop of the 99th precinct. There was a Bingo-card to play for the uniformed cops, detailing all the different ways that Peralta might drop dead soon if his ridiculous luck finally stopped working. (And there was a small shout of BINGO several times a week.)   
Yet in the end, he’d always, always get up, force that stupidly wide grin on his face, throw in a joke or a movie quote, ignore the negative, and move on.    
Some admired him for that kind of tenacity. Some just marked him down as emotionally stunted and slightly idiotic and moved on. Others, the ones closest to him, his own team, were always a bit worried about it. Try as they might, they couldn’t get through to him that this was clearly not the healthy way to deal with it. Any attempts at breaching the topic later on was shut down just as quickly as the topic itself had been, with a wink and a smile and some quick finger-guns before he exited the scene.   
Because in the end, they were all wrong. Jake Peralta didn’t  _ not _ know how to deal with negative experiences. In fact, he knew how to deal with them very, very well, he reasoned. After all, he’d learned from a very early age.   
And what he’d learned was: you dealt with that shit alone.

You didn’t bother people with it. You especially didn’t bother  _ your _ people with it. There was more than enough reason for them to drop you anyway, you didn’t have to give them more by being a whiny, weak little thing.  _ Seriously? _ , he’d hear his father’s voice echo through his mind years later, every time he slumped down on his dirty old sofa with tears building up in his eyes after a harrowing case or a night at the hospital.  _ You broke that easily? No wonder they think you’re an idiot.  _ As much as he tried to pretend he was out of his life, the old man was in some way eternally with him, a low voice that surged up during the worst of times, whispering into his ear about ‘worthlessness’ and ‘weaknesses’. 

It was a lesson he’d learned long before Roger had left them. When he came home with bruises - with stories about the bullies at school - with tears about some failed exams, screaming teachers, extra hours of detention - that’s what he’d get.  _ Toughen up. Don’t let them see you go down. Chin up, hit back, and don’t bother me with that shit. _

If he had any chance to think about it objectively, Jake would’ve gotten angry. He was a kid. Barely seven. He should’ve been allowed to cry over injuries, he should’ve had a chance to crawl under his parent’s covers after nightmares, he shouldn’t have been afraid to share his worries and insecurities with them. But he’d tried, and he’d been rebuked. Hard. Roger would slap a band-aid over the blood and tell him to clean up after himself. He’d shove him out of the bed, tell him to go back to his room before he’d  _ make  _ him and lock the door so he’d stay there the rest of the night. He’d snort over his beer at dinner when Jake mentioned another failed test, or how his history teacher would always pick him for the worst tasks, or how the principal would roll his eyes every time he showed up for another detention. He’d tell him to man up -  _ man up, to a seven year old boy  _ \- and get it over with, and that real life was waiting with far worse things than that, so he’d better get ready for it.

It didn’t get better after his dad had left - it all just changed tone. Blatant abuse simply turned into apathetic disinterest. His mom wasn’t as harsh, nor did she share her ex-husband’s attitude to child-rearing, but she also wasn’t really there. Working overtime on two jobs to help them get through, her time at home was mostly focussed on rest, not on being extra attentive to whatever little problem her son would come up with that day. And he’d very quickly convinced himself that all he had was little problems, nothing he should actually complain about.  _ It’s not that bad, Jake, just walk it off and have some ice cream  _ was maybe meant nicely to help him keep his head up, but it mostly just sat in his memories as another reminder that it was wrong to feel any way but joyful. When his mom sat at the dinner table, watching him poke through the vegetables he was already beginning to hate and asking him how his day had been, he made sure to flash her a smile and pick some nonsensical story from lunch break or whatever had been on TV when he’d come home. She would smile and nod and tell him to eat some carrots, at least, and things would be fine. He troubled her enough.

By the time he got to spend more time over at his Nana’s and with Gina, the idea of opening up to anyone was already becoming an absurd notion, coupled with the awkwardness of his teenage years. He’d sat on Nana’s beige, flower-patterned couch once, heart-broken over a girl who’d told him that she’d rather break his stupid big nose than touch any other part of his face (and several worse insults with her friends later on), tears only starting to well up in his eyes. Grandma, to whom he’d forever be the cute little boy running around in dinosaur pj’s without a care in the world, had patted his arm and told him to forget her, and, most importantly, that  _ big boys don’t cry.  _ He’d sniffled, wiped his eyes and felt like he’d never been this dumb before. Crying over emotions? Ridiculous. No wonder Nancy Liebstein hated him. 

“Hey, Linny.” He mumbled one day, flat on his back on the floor while Gina was busy painting her nails on her bed and only shot him a dirty look for trying out that nickname she hated. “What do you do when you feel, like, real shitty? Like when you had a bad day and want to feel better?”   
“I don’t have bad days. I’m awesome.”

“Oh, sure.” He awkwardly scratched his shirt that definitely needed a wash yesterday rather than tomorrow. Mom had been too busy to go through his room for the laundry. Mom had been too busy for a lot of stuff lately.

“But I do like a care-day, you know. Pampering myself. Making myself even more gorgeous. With like, a long shower and lots of skincare and warm towels and a freshly made bed for some beauty sleep.”

Teen-Jake pulled a face at that and wondered why he would ever ask a  _ girl  _ for advice. He knew that he could count on Gina - if he really needed help, she’d be there for him. Yeah, she’d lord it over him and ask for favours afterwards like no one’s business, but she’d help. But that didn’t mean she’d  _ understand.  _ And anyways, it became increasingly clear to Jake that whatever he was dealing with at the moment, it simply couldn’t be bad enough to warrant asking for help. He could see her roll his eyes and sigh if he mentioned another failed test, another pick for ‘most likely to eat his lunch in the bathroom today because Dave Dinopolous decided he looked like a pussy and deserved a few slaps for it’. As if a ‘care day’ was gonna help with any of that.

The thought of a warm, soft towel waiting for him and the imagined smell of fresh linen, however, followed him all the way through his hasty cold-ish shower that evening, quickly dashed into broken shards when he pressed his face into the always a bit scratchy washcloth picked up from the floor. His bed hadn’t been made for nearly a month, but at least that meant his comics and a plate of half-eaten cookies was still there for comfort.

He filed away the silly idea of fancy towels into the part of his brain that always made sure to forget the important bits anyway, steeled himself for the next day at school and the promised beat-down from this year’s bully, and told himself to  _ chin up, hit back, and don’t bother anyone with that shit. _

  
It had become a good routine even after high school was over and he slipped into a string of minimum wage service jobs to save up and get into the Academy program. Deal with the bad shit yourself, give Gina’s worried look when you meet her a wide grin and a thumbs-up, patch up the nicks from yet another fight with some duct tape. Smile. Don’t think about hiding in your bed, about laying your head on someone’s shoulder and having a good cry. Make a joke. Ignore that permanent nagging feeling in your chest and the knot in your stomach while another unsatisfied customer screams into your face.  _ Toughen up. just walk it off and have some ice cream. Don’t cry. _

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone has any ideas for the squares on the Bingo card of "Peralta ways to die once his luck dries up", I'm all ears. I've already got some very amusing suggestions.


End file.
